Lights and Lamps
by Ravenous Raven
Summary: "Did I wake you?" she asked. He glanced down at her, surprised. "No," he said eventually as he the clinic door hissed open "Those idiot dunderheads did." Haymitch/OC, drabble about PTSD, life District 13 and coping after escaping the Capitol.


She didn't know what woke her. Maybe it was a noise in the hall or the hunger from a stomach slowly adjusting to having stable meals. All she knew was that when she opened her eyes, the room was pitch dark. At first she thought she was still asleep, or dreaming. But then she lifted her hand up to her face, felt the brush of her lashes against her fingertips, and knew. She was trapped in a box in the dark and the silence again.

The huffs of her ever-louder breath and the pounding of her heartbeat in her ears were the only sounds in the entire world. Even the ever-present sound of static was gone, the light strip lining the door completely out, not crack of light at the seam of the door. Her sheets were a straight-jacket and she struggled free of them, falling onto the cold metal floor. It burned the bottoms of her feet as she stumbled to the door, her hand hitting the wall in a haphazard pattern until she hit the right part of the panel and the door slid open noiselessly, letting the dimmed yellow light and buzz of the light strips of the hallway greet her. It wasn't enough.

She ran down the hall, her bare feet slapping on the cold surface, her fingers running along the hall wall to push away the shadows around her. She was like a rabbit being hunted in her own burrow. Every twist and turn in the hallway was both familiar and terrifying to her. Finally she halted in front of the supply closet. The door opened with another open-handed slap on the panel and the light strips flickered on, brighter and harsher than their dimmed cousins in the hall. But she welcomed the pain of their light on her eyes before casting her eyes and hands downward, rummaging through items hastily.

She had just closed her hands around the smooth plastic covering of a lamp when she heard the tramp of boots. Hurriedly she wedged the lamp under one arm and, one-handed, upended boxes and objects until a small pack of power cylinders fell at her feet. She snatched them up, her fingers prying at the flap when a large hand jerked her out of the closet. She fell heavily, still clutching the lamp, the power cylinders pattering onto the floor like bullets. Cradling her treasures to her chest, she looked up at the Peacemakers'-_no, District 13, not the Capitol_-and their guns.

There was shouting, but perhaps her ears weren't working properly because she couldn't tell what they were saying. She just shook her head, and kept shaking it as their shouts grew louder. One of them tried to pull the lamp from her hands and she wrapped her arms even tighter around it. She did not relinquish her grip even as a sharp blow landed on her cheekbone and as rough hands tried to pull her to her feet. She curled in on herself, letting her weight drop and they let her fall among the power cylinders. When one of her hands snaked out from its grip on the lantern and scrabbled for a nearby cylinder, a heavy boot was brought down on her arm. The snapping of her wrist was lost in her scream of pain, the first sound she had uttered all night.

"_What is going on?_" She lifted her head slightly off of the cool floor, still hunched over her prizes to see the Peacemakers-_District 13's workers_-turning like puppets to face..._Haymitch_.

She heard the sharp, angry voices of the soldiers and Haymitch's deeper one speaking in clipped, short tones and tried to focus on the sounds. She heard the words "_thief_" and "_apprehended_" and "_cells_." She doubted District 13's cells were lighted. Cradling her broken wrist, she let her hair fall forward, masking her face as she looked at the space between the soldiers' feet. If she could just slip away-

But suddenly someone was crouching in front of her. She shrank back before she realized that it was Haymitch. His words were soft and he had to repeat himself several times before she understood him.

"I'm fine," she replied, but his cool hand had reached out and touched her cheek bone and then her wrist, making her hiss in pain.

"I'm going to get you to the clinic," he told her and she nodded numbly. As he tried to help her to her feet, she jerked to a stop.

"What is it?"

"The-the power cylinders." He understood at once, stooping down and scooping up some of the small cylinders and stuffing them into her good hand before she closed it into a fist, hugging the lantern tighter to her. His arm around her shoulders, he hauled her up, moving her towards the end of the hall. A soldier blocked them, rumbling something about the cells again, but she heard Haymitch say sharply, "Bring it up with Coin, then. I will vouch for her."

Somehow the dark mass of soldiers parted and Haymitch was leading her down the hall, the soft treads of their feet the only sound. As they turned the corner towards the clinic, she realized that he, like she, was still in his night clothes.

"Did I wake you?" she asked. He glanced down at her, surprised.

"No," he said eventually as he the clinic door hissed open "Those idiot dunderheads did." Smiling slightly, she let herself be led into the bright light of the clinic.


End file.
